Another Stamp Society Bites The Dust

PostmasterGS, scb, and the handful of other technically forward thinkers,
Perhaps we should establish a LLC corporation, build ourselves a nice rack of servers and develop the 'go to' philatelic hosting service. Offer database, web design and other hosting solutions which would demonstrate how to do this the right way. Imagine the possibilities!
Don

Nah...online is a fad...just look at Amazon! (ha).

Societies, for me, in the past, provided:

1) Access to a publication
2) Access to other information
3) Social access to people

My view is that a significant component of #3 is being replaced by online forums, such as this. I don't know that societies are as essential anymore for #3 as they used to be. Some still have a place. This is partly why there will be consolidation of societies over time.

A lot of face to face interaction concerning philately is being lost, as seems to be the way with the new world. I bet that there were a lot of people who joined a stamp club mostly to make friends, and form an instant bond with someone who shared a passion with them. How many socially awkward stamp collectors have you met? There are a lot, and they cease to be awkward when talking to a fellow stamp collector.

I will say, that for people with limited time in their busy lives, that a forum such as this is a terrific way to indulge in one's stamp habit and interact with people in some meaningful way.

Societies certainly need to double down on delivering information to people. If a society can effectively provide a social solution somehow online, then it will win the lottery. Otherwise, people will continue to flock to free sites such as this for their philatelic social fix.

Such service could indeed provide lots of interesting possibilities. But having witnessed the stupid...err, low technical knowledge and understanding and vision of future (explain it like you would to a child, explain it like you would to a child, explain it like...ok, I give up ) with "powers that decide" , I fear any such attempt would fall to deaf ears and the biggest (and only) client would be "us"

-k-

txstamp wrote: "I bet there were a lot of people who joined a stamp club mostly to make friends, and form an instant bond........."

Maybe, maybe not. I've collected now for 58 years (I do know the exact date I started). I've never joined a stamp club. I do my socializing separately from this hobby. I do belong to APS and 4 other societies; and three philatelic libraries.

Some philatelic forums provide access to all three albeit the social access is online and there is nothing preventing from groups meeting physically if they desire.

There is local stamp club but meet at 7:30 at night. Too late for me. They have a facebook page that I joined but there is no activity except an occasional meeting notice. No one has tried to message me either.

After I retired I joined a local club with the idea of making friends. Bad idea. I think the main motive ought to be to further your knowledge and have an outlet for trading, etc. Most clubs are full of older guys who don't give you the time of day. I have a secondary interest in numismatics and went to a coin club meeting as a visitor recently. I wound up joining. Nice folks, families and young people, demographics I never saw at the stamp group. I fear both stamps and coins are fading as hobbies but coins are not as far gone as stamps. Sad but true.

Fixed.

I enjoy the social side of my local stamp club very much, and it doesnt bother me in the slightest that most of the members are 20 years older than me. As long as you talk about stamps who cares how old you are?

Also, they are by and large far more specialized in their collecting interests, but I dont find that a bother, either. There is always something to talk about.

The local stamp club also provides wonderful opportunities to broaden your philatelic knowledge, in an entertaining way, through displays and talks.

I belong to two stamp clubs, one in my city (Barcelona) and another one in Rpoll, 100 km away (a long way for us!). I go to the first, many tuesdays evening (6.30-8 p.m) to socialize and to read some magazines. It's just at a 20 min. underground trip. To the second, I just go one or twice a year, to attend the exhibitions and meet people, as I have to take the car.

Like many seasoned collectors (I'm 59) I have been members of several traditional philatelic societies over the years.....I remain an APS members and recently rejoined GPS (German Philatelic Society) after a 20-something year hiatus.

As far as local stamp clubs go, I've always been active in our Cobb County (Georgia) stamp club, as I was with the Hollywood (Florida) stamp clubs years ago.

Leadership takes enormous time and energy, yet one always receives much in return: friendships, education, experience. But every collector has to balance the limited time, energy, and funds to where they receive the most satisfaction. Most of us also have multiple demands on our time such as family, civic duty, other hobbies, the demands of a job, or health concerns.

Online pursuits (eBay, Stamp Auction Network, et al) take more time, energy, and funds than the average collector might admit.

Balance that with online forums, delving into research, specialty fields, and cultivating/maintaining philatelic friendships-- there's hardly time left over for "giving back" and actually contributing/posting here or anywhere else!

But many of us (you) DO try. For that I and countless others are grateful.

I can't wait to retire so I will have even LESS time for stamps.....

--Jim

Lots of postings here but not any real solutions .

The answer ------Put all these small clubs on one website, so new collectors can judge what kind of people and what the club members discuss .This will interest people to join . The site could be free to read but a membership is needed to join the discussion ,that will keep the riff-raft out .This seperate section memberships can help pay the expenses for the whole website .

Good grief, this is so wrong-headed! The "riff-raff" of today could be the collectors of tomorrow. Putting barriers between people and discussion is a perfect way to kill involvement. If anything, we should be removing barriers to communication and collaboration, not creating more of them!

And we wonder why the hobby appears to be dying.... when you discourage neophytes from asking questions (like several other stamp collecting forums I could name where newbies are bullied and mocked for "asking stupid questions"), what do you expect?

The whole elitist mindset of "philatelists and scholars" versus "mere collectors" who are beneath them is one of the biggest problems of this hobby. The snobbery knows no bounds.

BLEAGH!

Concur.

I'm going to go out on a limb and piss a few folks off in the process.

In my view, most specialty and smaller stamp collecting societies/groups are desperately trying to justify their existence. This is done primarily through benefit of membership. What are these benefits? Maybe a journal? A forum? Perhaps an occasional auction? Many of these groups do not have large rosters and fewer volunteers, as well as (sometimes) inner politics, and as a result they are in protection mode and as a result, their content, knowledge, and expertise is walled off from the rest of the philatelic community. These are BENEFITS only to be shared with MEMBERS.

The problem is it is a death nail. Anybody can come to this board and engage in a conversation on any topic remotely philatelic. And there are people who will be willing to engage. Most of the content and information you want can be found somewhere else, if you are willing to work for it. If you get good at research and asking the right questions, there's really not a benefit to joining many of these societies beyond merely being "supportive."

There is a quandary. Some of these small society journals are quite good and their content has value. So I understand that they don't want to give it away, but there aren't enough people people who find the content valuable enough to hide it behind a paywall.

It is an attitude that leads to Dan's aforementioned elitist mindset.

I do not know the answer but I do believe the whole approach to a stamp society needs to be rethought.

I belong to a number of small specialty societies, every one of which preceded the internet.

I think there are legit questions about how they survive and/or thrive in the new environment - Don, among others, likes to ask them - but its not like they adopted the membership-with-a-print-journal model decades after the world went online, so let's cut them some slack, okay?

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey